IE 7, First thoughts

I’ve been waiting for the full release of Internet Explorer for some time. I had a preview when i installed the Vista beta (RC2) but i didn’t install the IE beta onto any of my XP machines as i dont install beta software on “production” kit.

Now i fully understand why people prefer to use other browsers (Firefox, Opera, etc) but since ALL of the users i support use Internet Explorer i always ensure we’re using the same software as our clients where possible.

So when the download was made available last week i decided to install it onto my laptop first (just in case). I like the new tabbed interface and was especially pleased that the print features have been overhauled. The improved full screen mode was also a welcome change as the toolbar auto-hides so you can see as much of the page as your screen will let you. I haven’t managed to look at the RSS integration properly yet as i’m still using RSS Bandit but i did notice the orange icon light up as i browsed my favourite blogs. I even managed to test the anti-phising filter using some spam i received and this seems like a nice touch that will help my end-users.

The only downside for me at the moment is that when using the management pages of the Sonicwall firewall’s we use, any pop-up windows just appear as blank pages. No buttons or text. Nothing!

I tried moving the address into the different zones to see if there was a security settings prevent the code on the page from running but this didn’t make any difference. A post on the Sonicwall support forum seems to suggest that the next firmware update will fix this. For this reason i wont be updating my main PC just yet and i’m glad that i took the step of upgrading on the laptop first!

Andy Parkes is Technical Director at Coventry based IT support company IBIT Solutions. Formerly, coordinator of AMITPRO and Microsoft Partner Area Lead for 2012-2013. He also isn't a fan of describing himself in the third person.